Under an agreement reached between Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach’s counsel (including SLDN), the U.S. District Court in Idaho, DoJ, and the Air Force, the openly gay aviator won’t be discharged under DADT “until the Court can schedule a hearing on the motion for a preliminary injunction.” Fehrenbach has filed a legal challenge to his dismissal. [SLDN]

Obama’s Inc’s refusal to simply not fire him is another example of the conscious betrayal by Obama, Inc. Why must the courts force our Fierce Avocado to do the right thing? For over a decade, SLDN has tried to convince the Pentagon to change its implementing regulations to ban information that a servicemember is gay obtained during an investigation by police authorities being used to discharge anyone, in the same way that President Clinton issued an Executive Order banning use of such information obtained during a security clearance investigation.

When Gates first floated the idea of “more humane” regs on July 1, 2009, it was at least transparently motivated by a desire to damp down the fires raging over the ODOJ’s heinous defense of DOMA a few weeks earlier – just as was the White House tea for the gays the day before.

It also seemed motivated by a desire to counter the PR black eye Fehrenbach’s having gone public with his case. But, funny thing, within weeks Gates was claiming they couldn’t find any way to change the regs….yet this past February he suddenly announced they HAD found ways to change them. What changed? Obama, Inc., needed another boost in damage control.

So many expected the new regs to finally be obviously written to create a way to keep Fehrenbach. They were not, most obviously in not including banning information from law officials [the way they did that from clergy and various medical professionals] which given that Fehrenbach admitted having engaged in “homosexual conduct” remains, spin aside, his REAL problem not the disturbed guy who accused him of rape thus requiring the police to question him and he insist it was consensual.

Translation: Obama doesn’t give a flying fuck about gay servicemembers or they would have

1. changed the regs as described above, and

2. agreed to let him stay now rather than simply agreeing to defend discharging him in court at some future date the way they have defended DADT repeatedly for a year and a half, and

3. finally obeyed the now two-year old 9th Circuit Witt ruling as Gates promised they would announce in March but did not. [Last I read, the ODOJ was still going to fight it in court next month.]

With respect, I don’t care what hook or crook might save Fehrenbach, but you’re wrong about some of the facts.

“May 16, 2008: Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach meets with his commander and civilian authorities after a false allegation is made against him. Due to the nature of the allegations and in an effort to explain the circumstances, Fehrenbach MAKES STATEMENT TO HIS COMMANDER and civilian authorities. The information resulting from this groundless accusation is later used as a basis to initiate discharge proceedings under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” – Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

And, again, there is NOTHING in the revised regs that says information given to police cannot be used to discharge you. However ill-motivated, “not credible” his original accuser was doesn’t put the toothpaste back in the tube that Fehrenbach admitted to “homosexual conduct” himself.

“If there is compelling evidence that a person has engaged in homosexual conduct, I would not expect that these new regs would make a difference.” – Pentagon General Counsel Jeh Johnson, March 25, 2010.